Abstract
The emphasis of this review is atomically monodisperse Aun nanoclusters catalysts (n = number of metal atom in cluster) that are ideally composed of an exact number of metal atoms. Aun which range in size from a dozen to a few hundred atoms are particularly promising for nanocatalysis due to their unique core-shell structure and non-metallic electronic properties. Aun nanoclusters catalysts have been demonstrated to exhibit excellent catalytic activity in hydrogenation and oxidation processes. Such unique properties of Aun significantly promote molecule activation by enhancing adsorption energy of reactant molecules on catalyst surface. The structural determination of Aun nanoclusters allows for a precise correlation of particle structure with catalytic properties and also permits the identification of catalytically active sites on the gold particle at an atomic level. By learning these fundamental principles, one would ultimately be able to design new types of highly active and highly selective gold nanocluster catalysts for a variety of catalytic processes.
Highlights
Gold was initially considered to be catalytically inactive for a long time [1,2]
The comprehensive reviews and books about gold nanoparticles as catalysts have appeared, which cover many important aspects related to preparation of gold catalysts and their catalytic properties [13,14,15,16,17,18,19]
Due to the size dispersity of conventional nanoparticles, it is not possible to achieve an in-depth understanding of the origin of the sizedependence of nanogold catalysts; it is impossible to identify the catalytically active species in nanoparticle catalysis
Summary
Gold was initially considered to be catalytically inactive for a long time [1,2]. This changed when gold was seen in the context of the nanometric scale, which has shown it to have excellent catalytic activity as a homogeneous or a heterogeneous catalyst [3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12]. On the basis of their atom packing structures and unique electronic properties, one could study a precise correlation of structural properties with catalytic properties, identify the catalytically active sites on the gold particle and unravel the nature of gold catalysis [21,22,23,24,25,26,27] This has long been an important task in nanocatalysis [28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36]. The emphasis of the review will be on the preparation of monodisperse gold nanocluster catalysts and precise structure-catalytic activity relationships, the investigation of which is currently being actively pursued
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